I cannot invent. I shall never, never be a novelist. At the same time, I must write. Why? God knows. So that I’m left with this diary, this useless, driveling diary. If that is all I have, I had better get on with it. (19 September 1924)
How wonderful it was to reread An Appetite for Life: The Education of a Young Diarist, 1924-1927 by Charles Ritchie! I’ve read The Siren Years, Ritchie’s diaries written while working at the Canadian High Commission in London from 1937 to 1945, so often that I long ago lost count but I think I’ve only read this earlier volume once or twice, which is a shame but also a delight since everything seemed fresh to me. Ritchie is, as always, marvelously candid and his daily ponderings – here, unsurprisingly given his youth, focused on women, sex, and school – manage to be both amusing and touching.
I shall let Ritchie introduce himself as I certainly could not do any better:
I am seventeen years old at the moment but will be eighteen next week. By occupation I am a freshman at King’s University here in Halifax. I have no character that I know of. I try to be the characters I read about or the people I admire, to enter into their skins and act as they would, but no one notices. They think I am just the same as ever. My main vices are selfishness, vanity, self-consciousness, and talking too much. Also, what the masters at school used to call ‘impure thoughts’, but I don’t know if that is a vice or not. I am not altogether lacking in intelligence but I do not care about that. I want to be handsome and dashing and self-assured, but I am angular, beak-nosed, narrow-chested, and wear glasses. I am quite tall, but where is the good of that? I am a compulsive diarist and a greedy reader. (19 September 1924)
While the diaries do technically range from 1924 to 1927, only 1925 and 1926 are covered in any depth. They follow Ritchie through his studies at King’s University in Halifax and, of more concern to the diarist, his romantic sufferings, on through to his first term atOxford, which proves to be very different than what he had imagined and planned for.
Ritchie’s pursuit of and conflicted feelings over his first love definitely enliven his time in Halifax. Part of the joy of reading diaries from any period is recognizing that no, really, most things don’t change, that people are essentially the same with the same feelings and urges whatever century or country they may be from. Ritchie’s group of young Haligonians seem to spend most of their time paired off in the back seats of cars, on sofas in dark rooms, or, when the weather allows, in remote outdoor settings. Even as he’s pining over his fickle love, that doesn’t prevent Ritchie from enjoying what else is on offer (and, it must be said, there do seem to be a fair number of girls willing to do almost everything without any expectation of emotional attachment, which, clearly, is irresistible to the teenage boy). But poor Ritchie, his libido is a trial to him, though his angst over it makes for amusing reading:
Wouldn’t it be nice if for one day and night I could stop thinking of sex. I wonder if other people think of that one subject as often as I do, and not only thinking it. I sometimes wonder whether I am a bit crazy and this spring weather makes it worse. What would it be like to be castrated? A jolly good idea I should think, then I could concentrate on my work, pass my exams, save money, and have a brilliant career. People say that playing games takes your mind off it: ‘A healthy mind in a healthy body’ and all that stuff. Certainly I don’t think fencing will make much difference. Anyway I have not got a healthy mind and I am not sure that I want to have one. (19 March 1925)
And just as it was interesting to know what young people were doing in the backs of cars in Halifax in 1925, it’s equally interesting to read Ritchie’s observations on how different things were among his British acquaintances once he arrived in Oxford in 1926:
It is quite true that these English undergraduates do seem incredibly young. It’s the way they have been brought up. For one thing, they have never had anything to do with girls except sisters and the odd girl they met at a tennis party or a dance. They have never talked to a girl about anything. They are mostly virgins though they would rather die than admit it, and they don’t know anything about petting as we practice it at home. They talk about sex a lot but it is mainly smut and endless limericks. There don’t seem to be any available girls at Oxford, only undergraduates and whores. (30 October 1926)
What is particularly interesting to me is how the reality of Ritchie’s life at Oxford completely disregards the dreams and expectations he had built up for it. Looking back regretfully at the end of his first term, Ritchie can only sigh over what has happened to him:
I went into the musty, empty Union to write a letter to Mother, and could think of nothing to say to her that would not be a lie. She has an idea of my Oxford life that I used to have before I came up here – that I am taking advantage of a wonderful opportunity for which she is making sacrifices, and how can I explain to her what is really happening to me, especially as I don’t understand it myself. Perhaps it is a sort of education, but not what we planned. (15 December 1926)
On first arriving, Ritchie chose to ignore the established, close knit groups of other Canadian students and fell in with a fast set of assorted characters. He developed a fondness for gambling, which he could not afford, started to be interested in a young married woman, “an enthusiastic amateur” prostitute popular among undergraduates, and, to cap it all off, hosted a disastrous dinner party that saw the guests taking pot shots at street lights from his window, one of which hit a young lady (happily, only a flesh wound). If nothing else, his life offered variety: one day he’s tagging along when a flamboyantly gay friend goes to a notorious local pub looking to pick up, the next he’s off to a meeting of the Oxford Group. Oh, Oxford in the 1920s. Through all of this, he constantly laments his actions in his diary, vowing to turn over a new leaf every few weeks: to devote himself to hours of steady reading each day, interrupted only by exercise, tutorials, and lectures (which he confesses to finding pointless and quickly developed the habit of skipping in favour of reading the lecturers’ books). The excitement, the guilt, the disappointment, the giddiness – it is an intoxicating mix, the essence of youth and particularly those first few months at university:
I wonder where the notion of ‘carefree undergraduates’, as described for instance by E.F. Benson in his novels, ever came from. Most of my friends are hag-ridden by debts; dreading exams; and sexually frustrated in one way or another. Yet who would want to be any where but at Oxford? Certainly not I. (14 December 1926)
These diaries were edited by Ritchie himself after the success of The Siren Years and there are obviously passages that were consciously selected because of how they reflected the course of his life: his lament at having no adventures, affairs, or encounters with famous people to record; his mother’s hope that he will people a great, important man of the world; and his own thoughts at various points on entering the diplomatic service:
So little happens to me that is worth recording. No great adventures or tremendous experiences, or passionate love affairs. I know no famous people whom I came describe for posterity. (19 September 1924)
Ritchie went on to become one ofCanada’s most influential diplomats. Among other postings, he was ambassador to the United States from 1962 to 1966 and was the Canadian High Commissioner to the UK from 1967 to 1971. He came to have all the adventures and experiences he’d hoped for as a child, met countless people of note, and had a lengthy, very passionate love affair with the writer Elizabeth Bowen. And, thankfully, it’s all very well and entertainingly documented through his diaries.
Sounds fascinating. I’m a recent convert to Elizabeth Bowen and had read of her affair with Ritchie in relation to her wonderful novel The Heat of the Day, said to have been written during or afterwards. Love the extracts! Thanks.
Yes, they were definitely already embarked on their affair when Bowen wrote The Heat of the Day. They began their relationship in 1941 and it continued until her death. I haven’t read it yet, but’s there’s a book out there of Bowen’s letters to Ritchie and Ritchie’s diary entries about Bowen called Love’s Civil War. It’s definitely on my TBR list.
Based on reading your, I just ordered “The Siren Years.” Sounds like a fascinating life.
Excellent! The Siren Years is one of my favourite books of all time, definitely in my personal top ten, so I’m always thrilled to introduce others to it.